LAKE TROUT. 
11 
that may possibly admit it as a subgenus, and upon investigation some other skeletal characters 
may be found to establish its generic rank. 
In Fishery Industries Goode remarked: “It would perhaps seem like a hasty generaliza- 
tion to point to Salvelinus fontinalis as the form from which the lake trout has developed, but 
one may fairly take into consideration the fact that this species alone, of all the Salmo group, 
is usually associated with the fish under consideration, occupying the streams that flow into the 
lakes of northeastern America, and frequently entering these lakes. That fontinalis, even when 
retaining its predilections for the streamlets, shows tendency to extraordinary growth, when 
ample waters like the lakes of Maine or the lower stretches of the Nepigon, are accessible, is 
also known.” 
The skeleton of the togue appears to be more perfectly ossified than in the rest of the Sal- 
monidae. This with its forked tail at all ages and the same character in the young of other 
charrs suggests that the Lake Trout may be an independent divergent of some older common 
forked-tailed stock rather than a derivative of any of the other charrs. It is nearer to the 
alpinoid charrs than to S. fontinalis, as is, partly at least, indicated by the presence of teeth on 
the basi-branchials.^ 
Of the five New England species of charrs S. fontinalis is of the widest and most common 
distribution. The Lake Trout comes next and the others occur in only more or less isolated 
instances, so far as known. Such peculiarity of occurrences has been noted by European 
ichthyologists in the distribution of the charr in some continental countries and in the British 
Isles. 
Synonymy. 
Salvelini Nilsson, Propr. Ichth. Scand., p. 7, 18.32 (alpimis); (group name). 
Sahelinus Richardson, Fauna Bor. Amer., vol. .3, p. 169, 1836 {alpinus)-, after Nilsson. 
Baionc Dekay, N. Y. Fauna, Fishes, p. 244, 1842 (fontinalis). 
Umhla Rapp, Fische Bodensee, p. 32, 1854 (umbla = salvelinus). 
Cristivomer Gill and Jordan, in Jordan, Manual Vertebrates of eastern U. S., ed. 2, p. 356, 1878, 
(namaycush) . 
Lake Trout. 
Salvelinus namaycush (Walbaum). 
Plates 1, 2. 
The name used above is the most distinctive one in general use for this fish as it is primarily 
and almost exclusively a lake trout. Other strictly New England names are togue, silver laker 
1 The bones have been incorrectly called hyoids or hyoid bones in most fish literature. Comparative anatomists name 
no hyoid bones but describe a hyoid arch which is composed of a number of bones bearing different names. The teeth 
referred to are not on the bones composing this arch. The “basi-branchials” are by some anatomists called “corpula.” 
